Montclair Master Plan revision could permit up to 10 stories

NJ Transit Trains began running on a limited basis today, for the first time since Hurricane Sandy hit Montclair on Oct. 29.

Montclair's Master Plan, the policy document that guides land use and development across the township, could be rewritten to encourage the construction of seven- to 10-story-tall buildings in some spots on Bloomfield Avenue and structures as high as six stories near some of the township's train stations.

The goal, according to the consultants who are working on revising the Master Plan, is to concentrate much of the population and commercial growth that Montclair is expected to undergo between now and 2035 near rail stops, providing new residents and consumers with a variety of transit options.

"The bottom line is, it's going to be difficult for everyone to have a personal car going forward to the end of the century," Robert Melvin, of Group Melvin Design & Planning - the Woodbury firm rewriting the plan - told The Times. "There is not enough blacktop for everyone to have a car. Do you want your roads to be 10 lanes wide? It's a mathematical issue.

"So, if we can take some of the trips and turn them into walking trips or public-transit trips, you are helping the system of mobility. And helping oxygen along the way, too," Melvin said. "We are giving people choice. It's a plan about choice, as opposed to plans that only design around the car."

The land-use element of Montclair's Master Plan has not seen such an overhaul in 25 years.

About a year and a half ago, the state Department of Transportation gave the township a $200,000 grant to undertake this rewrite and to factor in various means of transportation when considering how land in the township should be developed.

Township Planner Janice Talley said Montclair was the perfect environment to test this experiment. "We have six train stations and we need to design and integrate mobility with land use," Talley said.

The ideas being pitched by Group Melvin bear a strong similarity to statements Mayor Robert Jackson has made since taking office in July. Jackson has advocated that Montclair's train stations be used to reel in new ratables to help offset rising property taxes.

"It just so happens that as were moving along on this independently. He came in and he had the same ideas, so I think they meshed pretty well," Talley said.

The Planning Board got a sneak peak this past Monday night at the draft of the new land-use and circulation element, which is expected to be officially debuted in about three weeks.

Public hearings on the draft should occur in January 2013, at which time the public can have its say on the amendments before they are approved.

On Monday, some members of the public already gave the consultants feedback.

Milton Horowitz, of Madison Avenue, questioned why Montclair needed to grow so much during the next 20 years.

According to projections from the North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority (NJTPA), the metropolitan planning organization for the region, Montclair is expected to have 700 new housing units, 187,000 new square feet of retail and 320,000 square feet of additional office space in the next two decades. That growth could be accommodated by simply allowing more five- and six-story buildings to be put up within the Bloomfield Avenue corridor.

The consultants who are preparing the new land-use element envisioned three alternatives that, down the road, would bring even more residential and commercial units to Montclair.

A roughly 10-member steering committee made up of Township Council members, planning officials, and members of Montclair's business districts settled on a fourth option that called for far more development than the NJTPA was forecasting: 3,500 residential units - five times more than expected - 400,000 square feet of new retail, which is about twice the number the NJTPA predicted, and 500,000 square feet of new office space.

Accomplishing such ambitious goals would entail putting up seven- to 10-story structures along Bloomfield Avenue, five- to six-story buildings around the Walnut Street Train Station, the possible addition of four-story mixed-use buildings around the Watchung Avenue and Upper Montclair train stations, and the introduction of two- to three-story mixed-use buildings in the South End Business District and in Valley Road's Frog Hollow business area.

"We discussed increasing the height, and basically when you increase the height, you are increasing the densities in these transit-rich areas," Talley said.

It's still an open question how much the zoning in those areas would need to change to allow such buildings to be put up.

On Bloomfield Avenue, at least, the height limit under the zoning ordinance is six stories. In the C-2 zone near the Walnut Street station, the height limit would have to be doubled, going from 36 feet, or three stories, to as many as six stories, to make the goals in the reworked Master Plan a reality.